Apple’s new third-generation iPhone SE, which starts at just $429, is just as impressive as iPhone 13 in early benchmark tests.
That won’t be too surprising to most, given that both handsets feature Apple’s latest A15 Bionic processor and the same 4GB of RAM. But it all but confirms that the chipset isn’t held back at all — despite iPhone SE’s smaller battery.
iPhone SE 3 packs plenty of power
It might look just like its predecessor, but iPhone SE 3 is actually a rather major upgrade. It now packs super-speedy 5G connectivity for the first time, improved camera performance, and — perhaps most importantly — A15 Bionic.
Apple promises its latest mobile chip delivers 1.2x faster graphics performance over the second-generation iPhone SE, but it makes no mention of processing performance increases on its website. But don’t worry; they’re definitely there.
iPhone SE returns impressive benchmark results
Despite a smaller battery than iPhone 13 (but bigger than iPhone SE 2), iPhone SE 3 achieves very similar results in early Geekbench tests. It returns a single-core score of 1,695 and a multi-core score of 4,021.
In comparison, iPhone 13 achieves scores of 1,672 and 4,481, respectively. There are marginal differences, but it’s highly unlikely they are going to be noticed in real-world use cases. iPhone SE 3 is a tiny little beast.
The test results also confirm iPhone SE 3 packs 4GB of RAM — the same as iPhone 13 and 1GB more than its predecessor. That should mean much smoother multitasking, and fewer refreshes when switching between apps.
It should also be noted that the A15 allows some other improvements that iPhone SE 2 couldn’t deliver, such as Smart HDR 4 and Photographic Styles, plus Live Text in iOS 15.
